Applied Sports Science newsletter – March 7, 2016

Jack Cork has vowed to keep putting in the hard yards after his “big shift” against Arsenal set a new record at the Swans.

Club GPS data revealed the midfielder ran 14km at the Emirates on Wednesday night – the highest distance recorded by a Swans player in all competitions this season.

The key figures behind the development of the Tottenham midfielder tell Jim White how a hard upbringing shaped England’s brightest star.

… I believe in staying prepared for the opportunities that I think I want, whether they come to fruition or not. You can do no greater disservice to yourself than to secretly want something, but then be unprepared if the opportunity presents itself. I stayed prepared, but when I didn’t foresee any viable opportunities coming my way during buyout season, I contemplated shutting down my court workouts and facing the reality that my life as a basketball player was over.

I started seriously considering accepting and starting one of my post-career opportunities. I even agreed with Debbie Spander of Wasserman Media Group to represent me if I chose to pursue broadcasting as my next career. But my agent, Michael Higgins, suggested that I give it a few more days to evaluate the landscape.

The Golden State Warriors’ biggest opponent in their quest to break the NBA’s regular-season record for wins could very well be their own coach.

The Warriors entered Thursday’s game against the Oklahoma City Thunder with a 54-5 record, putting them on pace to beat the 1995-96 Chicago Bulls’ NBA record of 72-10. Warriors coach Steve Kerr said he is more worried about getting his players’ rest before the playoffs arrive in late April than trying to break the Bulls’ mark.

“Resting, that will take precedence,” Kerr said. “We will rest guys if they need it before we will go for any kind of streak or record, that’s for sure.”

… Monitoring training loads is one of the simplest ways to determine the athlete’s response to the training stress over a period of a time. By monitoring what an athlete has performed in a week (Acute workload) compared to what he has been prepared for (Chronic workload), the strength and conditioning coach can begin to build trends in predicting injury risk. Predicting and ultimately preventing injury is the “Holy Grail” in athlete performance. The Chronic workload can be determined as an athlete’s state of fitness, whereas the acute workload can be determined as the athlete’s state of fatigue2. The difference between the positive function of fitness and the negative function of fatigue produces either a positive (where the chronic workload is above the acute workload) or a negative (where the chronic workload is below the acute workload) training-stress balance. The assumption is that physical preparedness grows as chronic workload outweighs acute workload2 – suggesting that as fitness improves and fatigue is reduced, the performance of the athlete should improve. However, if acute workload outweighs chronic workload, the athlete is at an increased risk of injury – especially in the week following a negative training-stress balance.

Last week we held a fantastic conference at Aspire: “Monitoring Athlete Training Loads, the Hows and Whys”. We had attendees from all over the World and a pretty amazing line up of speakers, so I considered it a privilege to be able to give an overview of my experiences to the audience in the company of pretty amazing sports scientists.

In a loud and distracting world, finding pockets of stillness can benefit your brain and body. Here are four science-backed reasons why.

Can we break bad habits by being more curious about them? Psychiatrist Judson Brewer studies the relationship between mindfulness and addiction — from smoking to overeating to all those other things we do even though we know they’re bad for us. Learn more about the mechanism of habit development and discover a simple but profound tactic that might help you beat your next urge to smoke, snack or check a text while driving. [video, 9:24]

Muscles attach to bones via tendons that stretch and recoil, affecting muscle force generation and metabolic energy consumption. In this study, we investigated the effect of tendon compliance on the metabolic cost of running using a full-body musculoskeletal model with a detailed model of muscle energetics. We performed muscle-driven simulations of running at 2–5 m/s with tendon force–strain curves that produced between 1 and 10% strain when the muscles were developing maximum isometric force. We computed the average metabolic power consumed by each muscle when running at each speed and with each tendon compliance. Average whole-body metabolic power consumption increased as running speed increased, regardless of tendon compliance, and was lowest at each speed when tendon strain reached 2–3% as muscles were developing maximum isometric force. When running at 2 m/s, the soleus muscle consumed less metabolic power at high tendon compliance because the strain of the tendon allowed the muscle fibers to operate nearly isometrically during stance. In contrast, the medial and lateral gastrocnemii consumed less metabolic power at low tendon compliance because less compliant tendons allowed the muscle fibers to operate closer to their optimal lengths during stance. The software and simulations used in this study are freely available at simtk.org and enable examination of muscle energetics with unprecedented detail.

As neuroscientists explore the therapeutic prospects of brain stimulation, the amateur community are hoping the technology will enhance their mental faculties or well-being.

Lumo Bodytech, the creators of the Lumo Run smart running shorts and wearable sensor, today announced a partnership with world-renowned triathletes Mark Allen and Meredith Kessler.

Mark Allen is a Six-Time Hawaii IRONMAN Triathlon World Champion, coach and author. Meredith is currently one of the world’s top-ranked triathletes.

The Lumo Run wearable device combines the powerful data of a running lab and the personal attention of a coach. Lumo Run provides real-time feedback to improve running form and efficiency, which can increase performance and reduce the risk of injury. The lightweight, discreet sensor is placed on the small of the back, either in a clip or a custom pocket integrated into the smart shorts. This location is the ideal placement to measure key metrics like cadence (steps-per-minute), bounce (vertical oscillations of the pelvis), braking (change in horizontal velocity), and pelvic motions (kinematics) including tilt, rotation, and drop.

Wearables, motion-capturing cameras and advanced biometric data are already altering the landscape of the NBA. But that could be just the beginning. Researchers and tech companies are already at work developing the next wave of tools to advance the game of basketball. Here are five ways NBA players could optimize their bodies in the near future.

… Another booth I visited while at the MWC was that of the Institute of Photonic Sciences (ICFO) in Barcelona, Spain. While this blog has covered a fair amount of the research coming out of ICFO over the years, our coverage has mostly followed the more long-range research projects that have attempted to leverage two-dimensional materials and plasmonics for the creation of a new generation of integrated circuits based around photons rather than electrons.

The prospect of integrated photonic circuits based on plasmonics remains firmly in the future. But ICFO was demonstrating what it has been able to fabricate based on its work with graphene and quantum dots. Essentially, what researchers there have built and demonstrated (see the video, below) is a transparent and flexible photodetector.

CONTEXT:

?Hamstrings strain injuries (HSIs) are among the most commonly occurring injuries in sport and are top causes of missed playing time. Lingering symptoms, prolonged recovery, and a high reinjury rate (12%-34%) make HSI management a frustrating and challenging process for the athletic trainer (AT). The clinical practice patterns and opinions of ATs regarding HSI treatment and rehabilitation are unknown.
OBJECTIVE:

?To examine the frequency of method use and opinions about current HSI management among ATs.
DESIGN:

?Cross-sectional study.
SETTING:

?Survey administered to registrants at the 2013 National Athletic Trainers’ Association Clinical Symposia and AT Expo.
PATIENTS OR OTHER PARTICIPANTS:

?A total of 1356 certified ATs (691 men, 665 women; age = 35.4 ± 10.5 years, time certified = 11.92 ± 9.75 years).
DATA COLLECTION AND ANALYSIS:

?A survey was distributed electronically to 7272 registrants and on paper to another 700 attendees. Validity and reliability were established before distribution. Participants reported demographic information and rated their frequency of treatment and rehabilitation method use and agreement with questions assessing confidence, satisfaction, and desire for better clinical practice guidelines. Exploratory factor analysis and principal axis factor analysis were used. We also calculated descriptive statistics and ?2 tests to assess practice patterns.
RESULTS:

?The response rate was 17% (n = 1356). A 2-factor solution was accepted for factor analysis (r = 0.76, r = 0.70), indicating that ATs follow either a contemporary or traditional management style. Various practice patterns were evident across employment settings and years of clinical experience. Satisfaction with the current HSI management plan was high (73.6%), whereas confidence in returning an athlete to play was lower (62.0%). Rates of use were associated with belief in effectiveness for all methods assessed (P < .001). Higher confidence levels were associated with high use of several methods; we observed increased satisfaction (?2 = 22.5, P = .002) but not increased confidence levels in more experienced ATs.
CONCLUSIONS:

?Our study demonstrated the lack of consensus in HSI treatment and rehabilitation and the ATs’ desire for better clinical practice guidelines. Future research in which multimodal strategies, including both traditional and contemporary methods, are studied is warranted for effective management of HSI.

… One man who watches the Dynamo on a deeper level than most is Paul Caffrey, the club’s sports performance director and fitness coach.

Every day in training, players wear bibs that have a heart-rate monitor and a GPS module. After every training session, Caffrey downloads the information and gives it to the coaches so they can assess each player’s work rate.

It is not just a day-to-day or week-to-week adjustment. Caffrey said they’re trying to make each player durable for the season.